California Gov. Gavin Newsom puts distance between...

1of5Gov. Jerry Brown (left), after his final State of the State address last year, is joined by Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom as he talks with members of the Assembly and state Senate. Newsom now holds the top state job.Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle 2018

2of5FILE - In this Feb. 12, 2019, file photo, California Gov. Gavin Newsom receives applause after delivering his first state of the state address to a joint session of the legislature at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif. Newsom is sparring with President Donald Trump over $3.5 billion in federal money the state was awarded to build a high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and San Francisco. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)Photo: Rich Pedroncelli / AP

4of5(FILES) In this file photo taken on November 6, 2018 California's then Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gavin Newsom speaks onstage at his election night watch party in Los Angeles, California. - In a rebuke to President Donald Trump, the governor of California on February 11, 2019 was set to sign an order to pull most of the National Guard troops deployed on the Mexico border. Governor Gavin Newsom's office said he was signing the order ahead of his State of the State speech on Tuesday. "The border 'emergency' is a manufactured crisis," according to excerpts of the speech sent to AFP by his office. "And California will not be part of this political theater." (Photo by Frederic J. BROWN / AFP)FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty ImagesPhoto: FREDERIC J. BROWN;Frederic J. Brown / AFP / Getty Images

5of5Gov. Gavin Newsom listens in to Lieutenant Gov. Eleni Kounalakis at the State of the State address at the California State Capitol on Tuesday, Feb. 12, 2019, in Sacramento.Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle

SACRAMENTO — Gavin Newsom is the first Democrat to follow another Democrat into the California governor’s office in more than a century, but he’s made clear during his first six weeks in charge that his tenure will not be a third consecutive term of Jerry Brown.

It wasn’t just Newsom’s high-profile retreat from high-speed rail and twin tunnels under the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, two of Brown’s legacy projects. Newsom has also taken aggressive early steps on topics like housing and health care that Brown left on the back burner.

Meanwhile, two of Brown’s biggest priorities during his final term, confronting climate change and rolling back California’s tough criminal justice laws, barely received a mention during Newsom’s first State of the State address, in which the new governor laid out his agenda for the “hard decisions” that are coming due.

“I just don’t know if you could find two Democrats who could be elected governor of California who could be more different than Gavin Newsom and Jerry Brown,” said Garry South, a consultant who worked on Newsom’s scrapped campaign for governor in 2009.

Newsom and Brown forged divergent routes to the Capitol a generation apart. Brown, with gubernatorial pedigree, jumped quickly into statewide office and became one of California’s youngest governors, then returned nearly three decades later after a kaleidoscopic tour through local and state positions. Newsom rose through the ranks of San Francisco government before spending eight years as lieutenant governor under Brown, a relationship that was not always smooth.

“They just have a very different frame of reference,” South said.

Newsom began carving his own path from the first day, when he announced executive actions to expand access to health insurance and lower prescription drug costs. Among them was a renewal of his commitment to put California on the path to a government-run universal health care system — a concept known as single-payer that Brown dismissed as too expensive.

Despite pledging on the campaign trail to govern with the same sense of fiscal responsibility as Brown, Newsom unveiled his first budget plan days later with billions of dollars in proposed new spending. It included ambitious outlines to lay the groundwork for universal preschool, expand a tax credit for poor families and create a paid leave program for new parents. Newsom defended his spending proposals as primarily one-time expenditures.

In his State of the State speech, Newsom promised to sign “good” rent stability legislation if it reaches his desk, and called for modifying California’s environmental protections to allow expedited review of housing projects. Brown once said that overhauling the law, the California Environmental Quality Act, was “the Lord’s work,” but he never reached a deal that business groups and environmentalists could accept.

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Then there’s the Sisyphean undertaking of remaking California’s tax code, which Newsom says is too dependent on volatile capital gains from the richest residents. After pushing through increases in the sales tax and income tax early in his second tenure as governor, Brown largely left tax policy alone. Newsom has spoken of trying to reach a grand bargain, especially with a potential initiative fight over Proposition 13 protections for commercial properties looming in 2020.

“He came in ready to go,” said state Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego. Brown “was more perceived to be the academian and the thoughtful one and the profound individual as he looked at things. But Gavin just seems to have boundless energy, and he wants to get going on everything.”

That eagerness has already landed Newsom in the self-inflicted first crisis of his young administration.

Determined to take a tougher stance on high-speed rail — which had no bigger champion than Brown, even as it blew through deadlines and budgets — Newsom cast doubt in his State of the State speech on the viability of the full line from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Many took the criticism to mean he was abandoning the project in favor of completing just a section in the Central Valley.

Newsom later clarified that he wants the entire route to be built someday, and said the media got it wrong. Within days, however, President Trump had latched on to the project’s woes on Twitter, and the federal government canceled a nearly $1 billion grant for construction of the Central Valley section, citing Newsom’s speech.

Dana Williamson, a former Cabinet secretary to Brown, said Newsom may have thought he was simply restating what has been known for years — that there’s no sure source of funding for the full project. But by saying there currently “isn’t a path” to build what state voters approved, in a forum where reporters had no opportunity to ask clarifying questions, Newsom allowed people to draw their own conclusions.

“They got themselves in a bind,” Williamson said.

As Brown was introducing new policies, Williamson said, he often talked with staff about lessons he had learned from the mistakes of his first terms in the office.

“He took a slower approach because he had been through all these things before,” she said. “There will be lots of lessons. There always are.”

Vince Hall, who served as staff director for former Gov. Gray Davis, said it’s only natural for differences to emerge as a new governor tries to balance the expectations of 120 legislators, work with other states and the federal government, and engage and inspire 40 million citizens.

“Try to imagine doing all of that and not distinguishing yourself from your predecessor,” he said.

South saw in the State of the State address a parallel to a signature moment from Newsom’s first run for governor.

Preparing for a match-up against Brown for the Democratic nomination, Newsom cast the race as a choice between “a stroll down memory lane” and “a sprint into the future.” South said the line, which did not mention Brown by name, was intended to provide Newsom a graceful juxtaposition with the former governor, without drawing accusations of ageism.

“Will we choose the past, or will we embrace the future?” Newsom said at the 2009 California Democratic Party convention. “We’re not a state of memories. We’re a state of dreams.”

Alexei Koseff is a state Capitol reporter for The San Francisco Chronicle, covering Gov. Gavin Newsom and California government from Sacramento. He previously spent five years in the Capitol bureau of The Sacramento Bee, reporting on everything from international recruiting by the University of California to a ride service for state senators too drunk to drive. Alexei is a Bay Area native and attended Stanford University. He speaks fluent Spanish.